Josh Taylor says he began to feel a significant decline in his abilities by the fifth round during his fight with Teofimo Lopez.
Scotland’s Taylor lost his WBO title last Saturday night to former unified lightweight champion Teofimo Lopez at The Theater at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Taylor came out strong in the first few rounds, but once Lopez eventually found his groove the Brooklyn native never let up. By the late rounds, Lopez appeared to be on the verge of scoring a stoppage. In the end, Lopez won a unanimous decision (115-113, 115-113, 117-111).
The win was sweet vindication for Lopez, who, leading up to the fight, was dogged by travails in his personal life and controversies stemming from ill-advised comments he made to the press.
The southpaw Taylor, who gave no excuses in the post-fight interview, said his legs were “gone” by the back end of the first half of the fight. Taylor also blamed himself for getting away from his corner’s game plan by disregarding his jab and relying solely on his left cross.
“After about four or five rounds, I told [trainer] Joe [McNally] in the corner, my legs are away,” Josh recounted to Boxing News. “My legs are gone here. And because I was having success with the left hand. I was kind of loading up a bit, stopped working off the front hand, and I strayed away from the game plan and never executed it that well.
“So from then on I had a couple of rounds off, then I had a good couple of rounds [in] nine, ten, and then the championship rounds, I just had nothing left. I had zero energy left. I was in impeccable shape. Just fucking exhausted.
Taylor said he now expects to move up to the welterweight ranks.
“I think my days at 140 are really truly finished,” Taylor said. “I’ve been knocking at the door and moving up for the last couple years, and I think I’ve been to the well too many times at 140 so I’ll be moving up to welter for the rest of my career now. I’ll be much more comfortable.”
“I’m not making any f—— excuses, this and that,” Taylor added. “Prepared really well in sparring. Went through two, three sparring partners. I felt I did the weight well, I felt I did the diet well and the weight cut well.”
Sean Nam is the author of Murder on Federal Street: Tyrone Everett, the Black Mafia, and the Last Golden Age of Philadelphia Boxing.